


Your Hand in Mine

by Tangela



Series: It's Ineffable [4]
Category: Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Dancing, Feelings, Feelings Realization, First Kiss, Fluff, Idiots in Love, Kissing, Love Confessions, M/M, Other, Slow Dancing, This is so soft my dudes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-15
Updated: 2019-07-15
Packaged: 2020-06-29 04:12:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,162
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19822279
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tangela/pseuds/Tangela
Summary: Crowley tries to teach Aziraphale how to dance.Or, a glimpse into how two idiots eventually fell in love.





	Your Hand in Mine

It began, as so many nights had, with an angel and a demon getting very drunk in the back room of a bookshop in Soho.

Of course, things had changed a great deal since the whole Not-Quite-the-End-of-the-World business. Crowley had decided that six thousand years was quite long enough to pine, thank you very much, and had finally admitted everything. Aziraphale had just pulled him into his arms and kissed the breath that he didn’t really need right out of him.

They had talked well into the small hours of the morning - not that time really mattered when one didn’t need to sleep. Crowley had always found an excuse not to say anything. As a demon, he had a gift for being able to talk people into doing things they wouldn’t even have thought of doing themselves, and talking them out of doing what they thought was the Right Thing. As it turns out, he was also very good of using that same gift on himself.

It was fear that held his tongue. Aziraphale was not exactly known for his temper, but he could hold a grudge when he was truly pushed to it. Crowley had learned that the hard way. He had already discovered the allure of sleep by this time in his life, but it was around then that he’d figured out its other uses. Sadness really was a bastard.

And then, as if by some twisted miracle, came another World War. Crowley wasn’t sure if he was supposed to be proud of the chaos that humans managed to create amongst themselves, or angry that it made him rather redundant these days. It would only be a matter of time before Aziraphale got himself into trouble again, and then Crowley could just show up and save the day and everything would be back to normal.

And by Somebody’s will, that’s exactly what happened. No more was said about it for another twenty or so years, and by that point, Aziraphale finally understood what the whole bloody point of the argument had been. Crowley had always been a little further ahead of the two.

Things carried on as they always had. Crowley shoved all of the feelings down that were threatening to burst out of him – and kept shoving until he could shove no more – in the hopes that they would eventually just go away. Until the Almost Armageddon had slapped him so hard in the face, he couldn’t avoid how he felt any longer. It was as if God Herself was saying “Get on with it, already.” Crowley, of course, knew that neither of them were indestructible, but after six millennia, give or take a few years, one did start to feel pretty invincible. Watching Aziraphale’s bookshop burn down around him, with the thought that the angel who had owned it was now dead, made Crowley realise that they were really no safer from the End than the humans they shared a planet with.

It had been the night that Aziraphale had come to stay, before the trial, that Crowley finally broke. Something didn’t feel right, as if it had all been too easy. Crowley knew that something perhaps not quite as big, but certainly worse was headed their way. He’d already almost lost his best friend once. If something were to happen before he could admit how he felt, he didn’t think he could ever forgive himself. It wasn’t a demon’s business to forgive, after all.

Aziraphale’s reaction had caught him completely off-guard. Not just the kiss – although that had been more wonderful than Crowley could ever bring himself to admit – but the conversation they’d had afterwards.

“I’ve known from…almost the Beginning, I suppose, that you never saw me as an enemy,” Aziraphale had said. “At first, I thought it was because you thought yourself more powerful. But then I began to feel it. A sort of affection radiating from you. For me. And that terrified me. I thought you were manipulating me, making me feel something that wasn’t there in the hopes that you could tempt me over to your side. But nothing happened, and the affection kept growing. I’ve…I’ve known you were in love with me for a long time now, Crowley.”

Crowley was just about ready to hit the roof.

“Then why didn’t you say anything?” he asked, trying to keep his voice calm.

“Because, my dear boy, look at us. Humans have been obsessed with the idea of forbidden love for centuries. Look at all of the art and poetry they’ve dedicated to it. Well, you don’t get any more forbidden than us. I couldn’t allow myself to let those feelings grow. After we’d- After we’d parted ways in St. James’ Park all those years ago, a part of me was glad. I hoped I’d never see you again, so then I’d finally have a chance to let go of you.”

Aziraphale looked up at him with a guilty smile. Crowley knew he wasn’t trying to hurt him. The angel had always been very truthful, often to his own detriment. But after all of the years he’d spent with the liars and cheats and con artists of Hell, Crowley had always been grateful for his honesty.

“And then there was the whole business of the Blitz. I thought I was done for. I certainly wasn’t looking forward to the paperwork waiting for me Upstairs, I can tell you. And then there you were.”

A warm hand enveloped Crowley’s.

“I think…I think that’s when I realised just how deep your affection went,” Aziraphale murmured, giving Crowley’s hand a soft squeeze. “For you to do that for me, to walk on consecrated ground, after all that time apart, well, it really made me realise just how much I must mean to you. I’m sorry I’ve always been so much slower than you.”

Aziraphale smiled again, but even through his sunglasses, Crowley could see the tears beginning to form in his eyes.

“But I caught up in the end, didn’t I? I’m here now.”

The angel hastily wiped at his eyes with the sleeve of his coat.

“I just hope I was worth all the trouble,” he murmured with a shaky sigh.

Even after all of their time on Earth together, all of the things they’d seen and been through, Crowley didn’t think he’d ever seen Aziraphale look so small. Like a lost sheep wandering alone in the dark. Crowley supposed that wasn’t all too far from the truth, especially now.

“Oh, angel,” was all he could bring himself to say, before he was leaning in to kiss Aziraphale again.

Aziraphale went all too willingly into his arms, his hands making gentle fists in Crowley’s hair. No more was said between them for a while, beyond whispers of affirmation and endearment, their mouths pre-occupied with other things, far more interested in other things. Heaven and Hell weren’t finished with them, and Crowley couldn’t bear to let this slip through his fingers, not after all this time. And from the looks of things, neither could Aziraphale.

There was something to be said about not having to creep around in the shadows anymore, and Crowley wasn’t sure if all of it was good. Having it all out in the open, laid bare in front of him, was something that he had never thought would have ever been possible. And now that it was…Well, Crowley could have easily pulled the covers over his head for another whole year and hoped to Someone that the world and what lay beyond would just forget all about him.

But luckily for him, that wasn’t how Aziraphale worked. He had always been an open book with his heart on his sleeve, and just about every other cliché Crowley could think of. When Crowley wanted to slither away and hide, Aziraphale was there to gently coax him back out. Happily ever after didn’t happen overnight, but gradually, with time, Crowley began to settle, and each time they met, he let the angel in a little more. They’d grown closer in those short months than they’d been able to in six thousand years. If they wanted to kiss, touch, stay the night, talk until the sun rose, well, who was to stop them now?

No tendrils of past tension lingered between them anymore, no more thoughts of “Is today going to be the day where I finally slip up and destroy the one good thing I’ve had since the Beginning?” rattled around Crowley’s head anymore. No more secrets, and no more lies. Just them.

This, of course, meant that they were free to get as drunk as they pleased, with far fewer consequences than there would have been in the past. They were presently working their way through their fifth – possibly sixth, Crowley’s memory was getting a little foggy at this point – bottle of Château Lafite 1875. Aziraphale’s choice, Crowley didn’t particularly care what he drank as long as it did the job.

“If we’re going to insist upon putting poison into these human vessels, dear boy, then we might as well make it palatable,” Aziraphale had said.

Crowley couldn’t argue with him there. He was sprawled out in his usual spot on the sofa, one leg covering the length of it with his foot dangling off the edge – he didn’t need told off about scuffing the upholstery again – and his head propped up on one hand. Aziraphale sat across from him in his favourite chair by the table.

“You couldn’t top me up, could you?” Aziraphale asked, gesturing to his almost empty glass. “I think if I did it myself, it’d end up all over the floor.”

Crowley just lazily waved a hand, and the glass slowly began to refill, his own as well. Aziraphale took a sip and immediately screwed his face up.

“Beaujolais 1902,” he said with disgust.

Crowley took a tentative sip of his own wine. It all tasted the same to him.

“How can you even tell the difference?” he asked. “Wine’s wine.”

“It is not,” Aziraphale replied haughtily.

Crowley shrugged.

“Try it now,” he said.

“Much better,” Aziraphale said with a smile. “Thank you, dear.”

“Think I’ve had a bit too much, don’t even know what I’m conjuring anymore.”

Crowley stood up, stretching as best as he could, considering his current state of inebriation. He wasn’t quite so inebriated, however, that he couldn’t see Aziraphale’s not-so-subtle gaze on him, raking up the length of his body.

“Like what you see, angel?” he asked with a sly smile.

Aziraphale’s face quickly turned a deep shade of pink and he busied himself with the contents of his glass. Some things never changed.

“Mind if I change the music?” Crowley asked as he turned his attention to the record player in the corner that, unsurprisingly, hadn’t needed tending to all night.

Not that he didn’t hold a small fondness for classical music, but any more of it and he was about to fall asleep.

“I don’t have any of your bebop, I’m afraid,” Aziraphale replied, managing to stifle what could only be described as a giggle as Crowley glared at him over his shoulder.

Crowley placed the record in his hands down onto the player carefully, dropping the needle onto it.

“I don’t recall ever buying this record,” Aziraphale said, frowning as he tried to think through the drunken haze.

“And you won’t,” Crowley replied, “It’s a new addition to your collection.”

He carefully made his way back across the room, stopping in front of Aziraphale. Really, he had no idea how anyone was supposed to navigate this room sober, let alone drunk. It was one of the things he found so endearing about the angel – everything special had to be put proudly on display. The only problem with that was that his entire collection was special in his eyes, so naturally, everything was on display at once. Crowley’s current lack of co-ordination didn’t appreciate it.

“Care to dance?” he asked, theatrically holding out a hand.

Aziraphale’s eyes widened and he quickly shook his head, narrowly avoiding knocking his drink all over himself.

“Oh, no, no, I don’t dance,” he said nervously.

“Come on, angel, it’s not hard. I’ll teach you.”

Aziraphale’s face suddenly lit up.

“Oh! I do know one dance-” he began excitedly, and Crowley held up a hand to stop him.

“I told you in 1956 and I’m telling you now, you are not teaching me how to gavotte,” he said with insistence.

“It’s a perfectly respectable gentlemen’s dance,” the angel replied with a huff.

“Yeah, two hundred years ago, maybe. Now, come here.”

Aziraphale was still pouting, but he finally relented, placing his hand in Crowley’s and allowing himself to be pulled to his feet.

“Now what?” he asked.

“What do you mean, now what?” Crowley asked with an air of impatience.

Aziraphale just looked at him blankly, and Crowley blanched.

“Oh, you mean you’ve never…Really?”

“It’s one thing to dance in a large group, and quite another to dance with…one person, you know,” Aziraphale said defensively.

“One person,” Crowley repeated. “You were gonna say something else, weren’t you?”

“No, I wasn’t.”

“Yes, you were. What was it?”

“I wasn’t!” Aziraphale insisted, almost shrilly.

“Yeah, alright. But really, what was it?”

Aziraphale closed his eyes and took a deep breath. Crowley wondered how, in all the time they’d known each other, the angel had never once taken a swing at him. One really had to admire his patience.

“I was going to say, with the person you love,” he said under his breath, his eyes still closed.

Crowley stopped for a moment. He never did tire of hearing it.

“Made you say it,” he murmured with an almost wicked smile.

Aziraphale glared up at him, but Crowley could see how hard he was trying not to smile.

“Yes, alright, you win,” Aziraphale conceded briskly, “Now. You were supposed to be showing me what to do.”

“Are you saying you’re letting me be in charge, angel?”

“Don’t get used to it.”

Crowley moved a little closer, and Aziraphale let him, watching him with the ease of someone who knew they were in no danger. And he wasn’t. He never had been.

Crowley took Aziraphale’s wrist gently in his hand, admiring the blush that had crept up to the tips of his ears.

“Put your hand here,” he said, putting Aziraphale’s hand on his own lower back. “Now I do the same, and you place your other hand in mine.”

Crowley knew that he was supposed to move, it wasn’t exactly dancing if they were just standing in the middle of the room, gazing into each other’s eyes. But after all the time they had spent skirting around each other, he couldn’t help but revel in little moments like this.

“Are we…dancing now?” Aziraphale asked softly.

No, they absolutely were not.

“Almost,” Crowley replied, his reverie broken. “Just follow my lead. You’ll pick it up as you go.”

It took a little stumbling and quite a bit of swearing – not that Crowley counted a single word that was being muttered by Aziraphale as swearing – but eventually they found some kind of rhythm.

“Look, dear, I’m doing it!” Aziraphale blurted out cheerily, and the look of pure joy on his face made Crowley’s stomach flip.

Just the thought of having something like this had always been terrifying to him. No one seemed to understand what it was like, going through century after century meeting people, only to inevitably lose them. Mainly because few people believed that anyone could live so long, and even fewer would believe that angels and demons really did live among them.

So eventually Crowley stopped getting close to anyone. He liked to pretend that he was a hard bastard – in his own words – but in reality, he couldn’t bear to lose anyone that he’d let down his guard for. There was also the slight problem of humans eventually becoming suspicious when their friend of however many years didn’t seem to age at all.

Aziraphale was the only person in Crowley’s life like him, in more than just the sense of longevity, they’d both eventually learned. It made sense that they should end up together. But what if it went wrong? What if they fought, and never made up again? What if they grew bored of each other, now that that long stretch of curiosity had finally been sated? What if one of them _were_ to die?

At first, it seemed to be a coincidence that they found each other as often as they did. After everything Crowley had seen, Earth wasn’t really all that vast, but still, one would think it nearly impossible to constantly run into the same person when neither of them were trying to make it happen.

And then, of course Crowley was tasked with keeping Aziraphale from doing too much good, once Hell realised that he wasn’t on Earth for a flying visit, just as Aziraphale was tasked with the opposite. Not that that was particularly hard, once he’d convinced the angel that humans were going to do whatever they pleased regardless of divine or occult intervention, and really, wasn’t it better to save one’s energy for other matters?

“You could say the time we spend together is for the greater good and all that,” Crowley had said, idly pushing the spoon around his half-empty teacup one afternoon. “If we both know what the other’s up to, then who’s to say we’re not thwarting each other’s plans for good or evil?”

Aziraphale had been hard-pressed to argue with him. He always had been, and Crowley was surprised that it took him so long to realise that. At first, he’d thought that he was just that good at the whole temptation thing, or perhaps the angel had never really been all that dedicated to his job.

But then it hit him. The reason Aziraphale agreed with him so often was simply because they thought quite alike – more alike than one would expect from two beings on opposing sides, although whether Aziraphale wanted to admit it was another thing entirely. They both liked Earth, they liked the lives they had built for themselves over the centuries, and neither of them particularly wanted anything to get in the way of that.

And as it turned out, after many, many, _many_ years of denial and avoidance, they found that they liked each other. They were suited to each other, to their surprise. Conversation flowed easily, silences were rarely awkward, and no one could make one of them laugh like the other could.

It was as if they were made for each other. Not that Crowley had ever believed in fate, it all just seemed like a long string of coincidences. And he’d have believed that until the End. He did, in fact. But now…Well.

Things had certainly changed.

“What’s this dance called, by the way?” Aziraphale asked.

“Box step,” Crowley replied.

He was well aware that the box step required a little more distance between oneself and one’s partner, but Aziraphale hardly knew that, did he? And besides, it wasn’t as if he was complaining.

You’ve really never waltzed before? Not even at one of your, what are they called, gentlemen’s clubs?”

Aziraphale shook his head. “It wasn’t really something one would do, unless…”

He trailed off.

“Unless?” Crowley prompted.

“Unless one wanted to become more…intimate with their partner, so to speak. I preferred the large group dances. Much more fun. Much less chance of hurting someone’s feelings.”

Crowley had been fascinated by what had went on at these clubs of Aziraphale’s for decades now, but could barely mention of the subject without the angel’s expression turning to one of guilt, such as one’s often did when they were having fun while someone else was miserable. Still, it didn’t ever deter Crowley from asking anyway. He could be faulted – or praised, depending on who one spoke to – for many things, but trying wasn’t one of them.

“I see you’ve done this before,” Aziraphale commented, quite possibly in the hopes of changing the subject.

“A few times,” Crowley replied, trying to play it off as nothing.

“I see.”

Something about the angel’s tone seemed a little off.

“Can I tell you a secret?” Crowley asked hesitantly.

“Yes, of course.”

“I wanted to learn so that maybe…Oh, it sounds stupid.”

Aziraphale looked up. “No, go on. Please.”

Crowley really hated what those big angel eyes did to him. At least, that’s what he kept telling himself.

“I thought, you know, there might be a chance, someday, that you and I could…”

He had the love of his immortal life in his arms, and he still couldn’t even bring himself to say how he felt, even after all they’d been through together.

Aziraphale knew. He always did.

“I never knew you were such a romantic, Crowley,” he said with a sly smile.

He was quickly cut off as Crowley raised his arm and spun him around, catching him just before he lost his balance.

“Where would you be without me to always save the day, hm?” Crowley asked.

Aziraphale slapped at his arm breathlessly, and Crowley couldn’t help it, he started laughing. Something he was starting to do more and more these days, it seemed.

“You should do that more often,” Aziraphale said wistfully. “It suits you.”

Crowley pulled a face, but the smile was still there.

“Besides,” the angel continued, “What makes you think that you’re always saving me?”

“Uh, off the top of my head, your little stunt in Paris, that whole mess in 1941. I can go on, you know.”

“Yes, but did you ever stop to wonder why, in all of my times of need, you were there?”

“Well, somebody had to be. If it wasn’t for me, you’d have died years ago. Well, inconveniently discorporated. Same thing, really.”

Crowley knew by now, of course, that they were not at all the same thing, but he wasn’t quite ready to face all of that just yet. One thing at a time.

“You really think me that stupid?” Aziraphale asked with just enough of a pout.

“You really want me to answer that honestly?” Crowley countered.

“You don’t seem to understand. When you were saving me from almost certain destruction, I was doing the same thing for you.”

“Yeah? And just what was it you were saving me from, then?”

“Yourself. Them. You said so yourself, what happened to you, it was never an active choice. You just fell in with the wrong crowd.”

Aziraphale fell quiet for a moment, and he looked a little nervous.

“Angel?” Crowley prompted. “Talk to me.”

“Well, it wasn’t as if I couldn’t rescue myself, per se. I could have risked another letter or two from upstairs, if I really had to. But then I thought, well, if _you_ were to do it, then I’d know where you were, wouldn’t I? I’d know you weren’t out causing mischief, and I thought perhaps I could be a good influence on you. At least, that was my reasoning in the beginning. And then I found that I rather liked spending time with you. Whether you like it or not, you’ve always been a-”

“Don’t you dare say it.”

“-good person,” Aziraphale continued, as if Crowley had never spoken. He was very good at that. “Oh, come now, my dear, there’s no need to give me that look. You and I both know that I’m right.”

Crowley did know, but Hell would sooner freeze over than he would admit it. There was nothing on any plain of existence worse than a smug angel, and Crowley had had enough first-hand experience of it in six thousand years to know.

“Let’s just agree to disagree,” he said, a phrase that he’d picked up from the very angel in front of him, who wasn’t at all pleased that it was now being used against him.

“Very well,” Aziraphale relented, resting his head on Crowley’s shoulder.

The pair fell quiet for a time, the music of the record player a soothing interruption in the otherwise silent room. The box step had been all but abandoned in favour of the two of them just swaying in each other’s arms.

“So,” Crowley said after a while. “All this time, we’ve been sort of saving each other.”

“I suppose we have,” Aziraphale replied. He sounded rather content with that.

There were so many things that Crowley wanted to say in that moment, but none of them would truly express how he felt. He settled instead for pressing a kiss to the top of Aziraphale’s head. Aziraphale made a soft humming sound in reply and moved a little closer into the demon’s embrace.

Crowley didn’t need to say a thing, because Aziraphale already knew. And that was more than enough for both of them.

**Author's Note:**

> One day I will stop naming my fics after songs, but it is not this day. Title is from Your Hand in Mine by Explosions in the Sky.
> 
> I've received far more love on my little Good Omens fics than I was expecting, and I'm so grateful. Thank you for reading!


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